Slashdot Mirror
Cracking Crypto To Get Into College
Kallahar writes "New Scientist is running a story about a Canadian university who had students break an encrypted message in order to get into college. A good idea to grab a good student, but here in 'Free' America these kids would have been thrown in jail for violating the DMCA ..."
shut up timothy - the DMCA doesn't apply when the copyright holder asks you to break the encryption.
You mean like when Professor Felten was threatened because he met the challenge to break SDMI? Oh wait...
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
shut up timothy - the DMCA doesn't apply when the copyright holder asks you to break the encryption.
It is worth pointing out that Timothy isn't the one who made that comment. It was the submitter, Kallahar...
What do you know I wrote a novel
Hey hey, there's no need to bash Timothy. Kallahar is the one that said you'd get thrown into jail. Timothy just posted Kallahar's submission.
Oops - Mea culpa
Reboot macht Frei.
Following that train of thinking, I imagine the FBI will be setting up accounts on all the popular messenger programs, sending people illegal data, and arresting them if the file transfer completes.
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
Tell that to the RIAA/SDMI.
"You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocketship underpants don't help" -- Calvin
Of course, since it was just an encoded mathematical problem, I doubt they even bothered to copyright it. And it was the poster, not the editor, who made the stupid comment. I still would argue that the flambait line should of have been removed, but hey. Too bad you can't mod stories.
The idea sounds interesting, but kinda gimmicky. Especially with a scholarship for speed--with a problem it took 30 minute for _New_Scientist_ to solve (or did I misread something) that seems a bit silly. Now, waiving the application fee for anyone who solves it, that seems a more commensurate prize.
Just because you broke some method of encryption doesn't necessarily make you a good computer science student. What about good design or object oriented techniques? How about math skills and knowledge of discrete mathmatics and its relation to programing language design?
Since I know scripting languages, am I an elite hacker?
Since I can install linux, am I a sys admin?
Since I can make brownies am I Wolfgang Puck?
IMHO breaking the encryption doesn't mean too much.
- gtaluvit (prnc. GOT-tuh-LUV-it)
See, these people write in with links to articles, and they write a summary of the article and usually throw in their opinion. Those parts are italicized. Then an editor approves the story and sometimes they make comments themselves.
And sometimes they don't make comments. Like this time.
So, I think you owe timothy an apology.
"And like that
here in 'Free' America these kids would have been thrown in jail for violating the DMCA
All he'd need is a valid disclaimer. If he is creating his own crypt method then he just needs to say that it's ok to break it. Surely?
I think it's a good idea. Maybe at the wrong level though. I mean crack the code to get a place at uni? Should be more like crack the code to get a job, not to get into a school.
Kids, you tried your best and you failed miserably. The lesson is, never try. -- Homer J. Simpson
The land of the "free".
I wish that more universities in the US did this. It would help distinguish those that are intelligent from those that leaned over the shoulders of the intelligent.
.sdrawkcab si gis siht
You mean like when Professor Felten was threatened because he met the challenge to break SDMI?
Proffesor Felten was threatened when he attempted to publish his results - The specific charge, as I recall, was distribution of a circumvention device. This is different, one notable difference being that most universities won't try to sue you for entering their contest.
Reboot macht Frei.
That's a pretty cool idea by that Canadian University. This practice should happen more often. That way, the students with the talent and more importantly the desire can go into the field and will have a better chance to get in than, as is quite often the case, the better test taker or person with more money.
I understand that life's not fair, just why is it never unfair in my favor?
The cryotography turns out to have been very trivial. Here are the details.
He wasn't threatened when he broke it or because he broke it. He was threatened because he was going to do the un-American (un-Corporate?) thing and turn down the money instead to publish a paper on the subject [which he subsequently did present].
Disclosure of procedure is different than just doing something.
- Sometimes you're the pidgeon, sometimes you're the statue.
From slashdot:
But from the article:
And from slashdot:
Uh, yeah. Whatever.
Here's a link to the puzzle from the college's website:
http://www.whatmagnet.com/gofigure/index.html
they never said you werent allowed to break it.
they merely said you werent allowed to PUBLISH your solution.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
Perhaps you should get some sleep Timothy? Or lay off the Bawlz. In the morning you can brush up on the DMCA at any of these convenient sites. ;)
Duh, if you can't figure it out
I must say you are silly
A stupid idiot
Please tell me you know what it is
Elite hax0rs here at slashdot
Roadkill, eww!
Shit, it's almost done
Enter Sandman - Metallica
Xeno is cool
This reminds me of the Try2Hack website.. It consists of 10 or so challenges, each one harder than the previous, involving html/javascript, java, vb, packet sniffing, etc.
It would be great to see something like this as a final exam for anyone studying networks or security.
(And yes, the RIAA backed off...but the threat was credible enough that it left the lingering possibility that someone could be prosecuted under the DMCA for breaking encryption when invited to do so, if the inviter disapproves of what they do with the information afterwards.)
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
The New Scientist article was really short on details. Anyway though, I found the university's press release, which has much more details. It can be found here. This link also contains the actual puzzle in case anyone is so inclined to try to break it...
I got off the school's website the code that is to be broken. Can someone from Slashdot solve it?
HAHA you just made me crap my pants laughing. Keep up the good work!
According to the article, this sort of thing is not entirely new: "The UK government's intelligence headquarters, GCHQ, issued ac hallenge to job hunters in January 2000."
However, this was the first time that a university staged such a contest with scholarship money as a prize. And the University of Lethbridge's puzzle was a bit easier than GHCQ's puzzle, apparently.
I wish my university would give away scholarship money like this--I could sure use the money, and I'd like the challenge.
Do you mean "free as in beer" or "free as in speech?"
Aight kiddiez. Stop! Don't do anything in high-school!
Just drop-out and learn how to crack. Then you can
get in to school for free! Just beware of the Fed
in the white van across the street from your house.
:)
Well, canada regulations are a bit more permissive.
....but again....'american' like to be kings. :)
If you want to hack into a systems...destroy all machine running windows with a morphing-self-replicating virus....you better move to Canada.
Mafia boy got eight months in a youth detention centre for causing $1.7 billion in damages
If he was from US....few years? 10 years + 1,000,000$ ++?
Recent stories that people got cought growing marijuana in their house near montreal got less then a year in jail (7 to 11 months). 8 people in total I think.
American* justice is a bit too much 'american'.
*I hate to use the word american to designate US citizens. Candians are American too....since in America.
The point of college is to learn the things you have mentioned. Does filling out a college application or writing an entrance essay make you a good CS student? No. It just demonstrates your ability to perform a task involving some thought. Does breaking an encrypted message make you a good CS? No, of course not. But, it DOES show that you have strong skills in mathematics and analytical logic. Don't be so silly in jumping to conclusions.
Why bother.
All the code is is the index of the letters of the alphabet in base 4. There's a URL underlined in there that makes it really obvious what the "encryption" technique being used is.
This is a marvelous idea! Now that I've thought of it, I believe that every college should do something unique each year as part of its acceptance process. In other words, technical colleges might have you break an encryption, or fix some obscure bug nobody can find in a huge piece of software, or something difficult and obscure that most people wouldn't be able to accomplish. If you can do that, it adds major points to your acceptance process and gives you a huge advantage. Of course, other important stuff (like what grade you got in kindergarden) would still apply.
-_-_-O-_-_-H-_-_- -_-_-W-_-_-E-_-_-L-_-_-L-_-_- !
You know, this makes sense, up to a point. Most Liberal Arts kids have to write Essays to get into college, why not have Computer Science Geeky Kids Crack Codes?
Well, I think the major problem is the *lack* of creativity. This doesn't quite show that you have creative thought, only that you can deduce something logically. Now, as I understand it, that applies to programming, but really, if you're going to be a college student, life is more about creative problem solving than it is about logical.
Although, it is a neat idea. Will physics students be allowed to design experiments, or will others get similar "bonuses" to their college application process? I'd like to hope so.
Down with Standardized Tests, In With Creative Applications.
I'm about middle of my course of 400 CompScis, and it took me all of five minutes to 'crack' the code, and solve the puzzle. Any kid who's done GCSE Computation (aged 14-16) should be able to work it out in less than half an hour.
Are degree courses that easy to get on to in Canada? I had to get three A levels at grade C or above (and my Uni's not particularly prestigous)!
But then again, that would involve thinking about sport, which might be too much for the average /. reader.
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
The specific charge, as I recall, was distribution of a circumvention device.
You don't recall correctly. There was no specific charge. Vague threats were made, and they were dropped.
Timothy writes writes "Kallahar writes 'New Scientist is running a story about a Canadian university who had students break an encrypted message in order to get into college. A good idea to grab a good student, but here in 'Free' America these kids would have been thrown in jail for violating the DMCA ...'
If anyone's interested in the real story, they should go to this story in the National Post.
/. gets a bad reputation from time to time?)
Amongst other things, it talks about how the code is the first part of the challenge. The coded message leads to a math problem (which is actually kind of fun and has a rather elegant solution). Solve the math problem, and you get into school with the chance to win a scholarship.
Having gone to the site and gone through the decode and solve phases, I can happily report that the "code" isn't really a code at all. As the site hints, it's basically "coded" by being written in base-4. The challenge is really in the math problem, which requires applicants to find the summation of all decimal digits in the sequence of natural numbers from one to one million. While this isn't impossible, it does require some thought and intelligence. I thought it was a great idea for students who liked math and computer science (the problem can also be solved with a simple brute force algorithm) but weren't neccessarily that stellar students nor interested in lengthy University applications.
Heck - I spent an hour coming up with a solution and then verifying it with a quick little Java program. It was fun! Give it a shot!
(As a Troll-y sidenote, I'd like to mention with some degree of bitterness that I submitted this story, except when I did it, I got the facts right. Apparently this warrants a rejection, and irrelevant whining about the DMCA warrants approval. Do you ever wonder why
to win a scholarship
from the university
of lethbridge
do the math.
formula:
find the sum of all decimal
digits appearing in the natural
numbers from one to one million
inclusive.
contest entries must be
received by december 12/31/01
to enter online: visit
www.uleth.ca
and submit your
answer.
mail: send your answer, along
with your name, full address and
phone number to go figure what
magazine, 108,93 lombard avenue,
winnipeg, mb, r3b3b1.
"Exploit" is such a bad choice of words :P
"We know what happens to people who stay in the middle of the road. They get run over." - Aneurin Bevan
American Corporations are NOT American. They are the most UNamerican thig there is! Corporations aren't patriots, they are GLOBALISTS, thats why they allow third worlders in to take jobs. To BREAK the wage.
They couldnt care less about our country. If they did, they wouldnt ALLOW third worlders to take American jobs. Why should they pay an American citizen $100,000 as a UNIX SA, when a third wolrd foreigner will do it for $30,000?
If you're not a Liberal in your 20's, then you have no heart.If you're still a Liberal in your 30's you have no brain.
Was it "f u cn rd ths, u cn gt a gd jb n cmptr prgrmmng."?
Enquiring minds &c.
Tony.
-- "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" -- Juvenal
]:8)
All I had to do was submit my high school transcript with the application halfway through Grade 12. If you have good marks, it's harder to get a driver's license than it is to get into the University of Alberta. (Not to imply that it's an inferior University either.)
"It's not a war on drugs, it's a war on personal freedom. Keep that in mind at all times." Bill Hicks
maybe he/she should have said
profit from
Who would have thought the little University I went too would turn out a totally unique and creative idea such as this... :)
Speaking from experience, the CS courses there rival many of the larger Canadian Universities, and actually exceed them. If that's one thing the UofL teaches you, it's how to critically think, and code.
Sweet!
Does this strike anyone else as a great way to get someone else to finish up the work on your thesis for you?
If you have to know crypto-analysis in order to get into college, where are you supposed to learn crypto-analysis? Or is Canada yet another of those countries where university != college?
to win a scholarship from the university of lethbridge
do the math.
formula:
find the sum of all decimal digits appearing in the natural numbers from one to one million inclusive.
contest entries must be received by december 12/31/01
to enter online: visit www.uleth.ca and submit your answer.
Pfft! And I claim your stolen first post in the name of Orville Redenbacher!
My tongue-foo 0wnz you, biznatch!
You will ph34r!
"Adequacy.org: Where congenital stupidity is not an option, but a requirement."
Actually, it DOES apply. Professor Felten was asked to break it as part of a competition, but was then prosecuted fo it. Also, Dmitry Sklyarov was not asked to break Adobe's encryption, but a precedent was set when Adobe chose not to prosecute him, but the US government decided to prosecute him in federal court because breaking encryption broke the CRIMINAL LAW aspect of the DMCA.
It is definitely feasible that a college student breaking the encryption on an encrypted message, even when specifically asked by his college to break the encryption on a message given to him by his college, would be at risk for prosecution under the DMCA. It is a very broad piece of legislation, the specific wording of which could easily be held up in court in a variety of cases, regardless of whether or not the defendant was asked to break the encryption and whether or not the person that originally encrypted it had a problem with it.
So if I'm successful I go to college instead of university? Sounds like a raw deal to me ;) There's a big difference between the two here, with colleges being more trade-school oriented. Not that there's anything wrong with that! (a la Seinfeld).
DataSquid.net, a little about me.
In fact, someone who applied to Microsoft told me that he was given a puzzle to complete during the interview.
Is that just like the whole Adobe illustrator thing? I mean they dropped the charges BUT the local authorities were still prosecuting. Lawyer can twist this around to were it doesn't matter IF the owner wanted it done because it_is_still in violation.
This SIG pulled due to lack of funding. (This damn war is costing too much!)
I doubt they even bothered to copyright it.
Anything you write is automatically copyrighted. You don't have to register it or anything anymore.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
int main(void)
{
int c, i, j;
char seq[4];
char message[1024];
seq[3] = '\0';
i = j = 0;
while ((c = getchar()) != EOF) {
if (i == 3) {
i = 0;
message[j++] = strtol(seq, NULL, 4) + 'a' - 1;
}
if (c >= '0' && c <= '3')
seq[i++] = c;
else if (c == '/')
continue;
else
message[j++] = c;
}
message[j] = '\0';
printf("%s", message);
}
The answer is 500000500000.
Heh, I cracked it in less time than it took me to *find* the puzzle on their site! In fact, I "cracked" it before I found it at all, thanks to the hints they gave.
:)
What they should have said instead is "full scholarship to the first one who reverse-engineers the compression on the Creative USB WebCam". Now *that* would be a challenge! It'd be great for the Linux USB project too
The digits 1-9 appear an equal number of times from 1 to 999,999. That is, if you write out all the numbers in a vertical column, each column will have 100,000 1's, 100,000 2's, etc, except in a different order which doesn't matter.
The sum of 1 to 9 is 45. so the sum of each column is 45 * 100,000 = 4,500,000. There are six columns of digits, so multiply that by six to get 27,000,000. Now add the sum of the digits of 1,000,000.
The answer: 27,000,001
Not exactly a brain teaser. Anyone who can't figure this out (and is already a CS major) should think of switching majors to something a little less challenging.
- A.P.
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
For those who couldn't spend a couple of minutes writing a Perl or C program I did (bored) and here's the base4->Alpha translation.
:-) - not that bored
to win a scholarship
from the university of lethbridge
do the math
formula:
find the sum of all decimal
digits appearing in the natural
numbers from one to one million
inclusive
contest entries must be
received by december 13/31/01
to enter online: visit
www.uleth.ca
and submit your
answer
mail: send you answer along
with your name full address and
phone number to go figure what
magazine 93 lombard avenue
winnipeg mb r3b3b1
And no, i dont have the answer
--JQuirke
I'm not sure that this 'test' really serves to differentiate applicants:
- assuming that the base 4 transform really is as trivial as it sounds (can't get at the link - site overloaded probably) there are two ways to solve the summation problem:
1) with brute force summation
2) with euler's method (well, one of euler's methods [n*(n+1)/2])
with 1) you get the CS people who are sometimes too lazy to know the math.
but with 2) you get the math people who are too lazy to write the brute force algorithm.
But since this is a first-reply contest and since it is the cs/math departments accepting applicants, it probably doesn't matter who they get. Maybe they shunt people into different departments depending on the answer?
"This is different, one notable difference being that most universities won't try to sue you for entering their contest."
Heh - Go ahead, break our encryption. We won't scrue, I mean, sue, you, promise! Trust us!
Im not in America, but I get sick of hearing people complain about how its not free anymore. Its only 1 country. Things are a lot worse in many countries and a lot better in some too. If you want to improve then vote libertarian.
You spent an hour coming up with a solution that is named after the 3rd grader (Karl Friedrich Gauss) who solved the problem in about 30 seconds. This took me about 5 minutes to decode and under a minute to solve.
I lived in Lethbridge for a few months over ten years ago. It was a small town then and still is, as you can see here (less than 70,000 population).
IMHO, Southern Alberta is an attractive region if you're into farming or ranching, but doesn't generally have a large enough population to support the University of Lethbridge on its own. Calgary is only a couple hours away by car, and tends to draw the more city-minded students.
It seems the U of Lethbridge has to use these clever gimmicks to attract enough students from outside the region to keep itself viable. By making the crypto test relatively simple, it taps into the ego of a wider number of prospective students.
Pretty smart marketing move, actually.
Anybody want a peanut?
2) with euler's method (well, one of euler's methods [n*(n+1)/2])
This would give you the summation of all natural numbers between 1 and 1000000. The question, however, is to find the summation of all decimal digits appearing in the sequence.
For example, 324 would contribute a total of 9 to the total sum.
So, the sum of 0..10 = 46
the sum of 0..100 = 901
the sum of 0..10^n = (n * 10^(n-1) * 45) + 1
In our case, we're looking for 0..10^6, so
= (6 * 100000 * 45) + 1
= 27000000 + 1
= 27000001
As I said, a little more complex, but not impossible to figure out if you take out pencil and paper and think about it.
To verify, simply create a brute force algorithm that loops from 1 to 1000000, where the loop code either uses mod and div to isolate the value of each digit of a number, or some funky string-integer transformations.
oh right Gauss. Got Euler and Gauss mixed up.
But wasn't the story that Gauss got into trouble for using his summation method? Maybe these guys require a manual summation...
Assuming that Gauss came up with a method to do this, and you're not mistakenly referring to Euler, then zoombah - you're smarter than me. Take a friggin' bow.
Assuming that you, like many others, failed to read the question and just found the summation of natural numbers between 1 and 1000000, then take another look at the wording and go back to the drawing board, Spanky.
Y'all are freaking retarded. If there is anything that the Skylarov(sic), the copyright holder doesn't have to grant the Government permission to charge someone with a crime. The DMCA is very much a Criminal law as much as a Civil law. Even after adobe backed out, he still got charged for the crimes committed. In this case, I doubt anyone would get charged. Doesn't mean it couldn't or wouldn't happen.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
'nuff said.
Wow! I just made a poem!
You're using her as bait, Master!
First off, I went into the site and couldn't even figure out the navigation well enough to even want to go through it. And, for a scholarship don't they think they could have come up with a little bit of a harder problem? After giving up on their silly site, I perused slashdot and was kind of disappointed that it was that silly.
The college I attended had an annual competition where high school students built robotics or coded something, and would give out some degree of scholarships or other financial assistance towards prospective students and I can tell you that anybody who wrote a program to find the summation of all natural numbers would be laughed out. These were things like kernels, AI schemes, language recognition applications. I fail to see the cool factor in this. Any nerd deserving a scholarship for brains alone should really be challenged and not something that can be solved by a 2 minute script.
Dacels Jewelers can't be trusted.
Y'all are freaking retarded. If there is anything that the Skylarov(sic), the copyright holder doesn't have to grant the Government permission to charge someone with a crime. The DMCA is very much a Criminal law as much as a Civil law. Even after adobe backed out, he still got charged for the crimes committed. In this case, I doubt anyone would get charged.
Doesn't mean it couldn't or wouldn't happen.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
The hard part is to get the text corresponding to the encoded message so that you don't have to type it in. The ULeth Press Release has a JPEG (are you supposed to do OCR?), and the Go Figure web site has a really messy navigational structure and the message hidden in a PDF file. Now, getting it out requires experience with Adobe Acrobat or some other PDF tools. That's much harder than undoing the simple encoding or solving the trivial math problem.
yes, but the point here is that if the copyright holder grants you permission, there is no breach of copyright in the first place ...
>A good idea to grab a good student, but here in 'Free' America these kids would have been thrown in jail for violating the DMCA
Uninformed mudslinging doesn't help the cause...
Felten was never prosecuted, he was threatened with prosecution. I could threaten you with prosecution for spreading false information, but that certanly wouldn't make it a crime
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I'm a senior in highschool and I "cracked" the "code" in about 6min....The hardest of the whole thing was running find and replace for their base 4 alphabet(I was too lazy to write a script for it), and then punching some numbers into my scientific calculator. I wish some US schools would do this, then maybe I could afford to go to the schools I get accepted to.....
-sonicsft
The story about the young student Gauss coming up with the means of summing 1 to n (a task his teacher had set his class as an exercise in time-wasting) is available here.
(Given that you know enough math to solve the problem as you describe it, I'm actually kind of surprised you've never heard the story, but I guess I did have instructors that liked math history.)
Yeah, it sucks that nobody seems to understand what you said (i.e. the distinction between sum of integers and sum of their decimal digits), but hey, it is Slashdot. Did you expect better?
The NSA has some fun problems on its USA Mathematical Talent Search (USAMTS) page.
2^(2^(2^2 + 1) - 1) - 1 = 2^31 - 1: Mersenne prime
The biggest trick the devil pulled was letting lawyers become politicians so they can write the laws.
I've got a picture of a turtle and another picture of a pirate that you can try to draw freehand for a chance at a scholarship to an art school.
Let me know if you want the details.
-Rothfuss
#!/usr/local/bin/perl
//, $t;
.. 'z' )
/
/[^0123]+/, $code;
.. 1000000 )
3 /b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b 3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/ b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3 /b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b 3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/ b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b
use strict;
use vars qw/
/;
# START: 1:28am -> 2:38am
# DURATION: 70 minutes
sub quagit2dec($)
{
my $t = $_[0];
# return "" if $t =~ m/[0123]/;
my @a = split
my $dec = $a[2] * 1 + $a[1] * 4 + $a[0] * 16;
return $dec;
}
sub dec2alpha($)
{
my $d = $_[0];
# return "" if $d =~ m/[0-9]/;
my $idx = 1;
for my $i ( 'a'
{
# print "[$i|$idx|$d]";
return $i if ( $idx == $d );
$idx++;
}
return "?";
}
sub main()
{
my $code = qq{
110/033/ 113/021/032/ 001/ 103/003/020/033/030/001/102/103/020/021/100/
012/102/033/031/ 110/020/011/ 111/032/021/112/011/102/103/021/110/121/
033/012/030/011/110/020/002/102/021/010/013/011
010/033/ 110/020/011/ 031/001/110/020/.
012/033/102/031/111/030/001/:
012/021/032/010/ 110/020/011/ 103/111/031/ 033/012/ 001/030/030/ 010/011/003/021/031/001/030/
010/021/013/021/110/103/ 001/100/100/011/001/102/021/032/013/ 021/032/ 110/020/011/ 032/001/110/111/102/001/030/
032/111/031/002/011/102/ 103/012/102/033/031/ 033/032/011/ 110/033/ 033/032/011/ 031/021/030/030/021/033/032/
021/032/003/030/111/103/021/112/011/.
003/033/032/110/011/103/110/ 011/032/110/102/021/011/103/ 031/111/103/110/ 002/011/
102/011/003/011/021/112/011/010/ 002/121/ 010/011/003/011/031/002/011/102/ 12/31/01
110/033/ 011/032/110/011/102/ 033/032/030/021/032/011/: 112/021/103/021/110/
113/113/113/.111/030/011/110/020/.003/001/ 001/032/010/ 103/111/002/031/021/110/ 121/033/111/102/
001/032/103/113/011/102/.
031/001/021/030/: 103/011/032/010/ 121/033/111/102/ 001/032/103/113/011/102/,/ 001/030/033/032/013/
113/021/110/020/ 121/033/111/102/ 032/001/031/011/,/ 012/111/030/030/ 001/010/010/102/011/103/103/ 001/032/010/
100/020/033/032/011/ 032/111/031/002/011/102/ 110/033/ 013/033/ 012/021/013/111/102/011/ 113/020/001/110/
031/001/013/001/122/021/032/011/,/108/,/93/ 030/033/031/002/001/102/010/ 001/112/011/032/111/011/,
113/021/032/032/021/100/011/013/, 031/002/, 102/3/002/3/002/1/.
};
my @quagit = split
my $xmsg = $code;
#for my $pt ( @quagit )
#{
# my $td = quagit2dec( $pt );
# my $da = dec2alpha( $td );
# print "$da";
#}
my $cnt = 0;
while( $xmsg )
{
$xmsg =~ m/([0123][0123][0123])\//;
print $`;
my $v = $1;
my $t = quagit2dec( $v );
my $d = dec2alpha( $t );
print $d;
$xmsg = $';
$cnt++;
last if ( $cnt > 450 );
}
my $val = 0;
for my $nb ( 1
{
$val = $val + $nb;
}
print "\n\n SUM of 1..1,000,000 => $val \n";
exit;
}
main;
exit;
1;
__END__
DECODED OUTPUT:
===============
to win a scholarship
from the university
oflethbridge
do the math.
formula:
find the sum of all decimal
digits appearing in the natural
number sfrom one to one million
inclusive.
contest entries must be
received by december 12/31/01
to enter online: visit
www.uleth.ca and submit your
answer.
mail: send your answer,/ along
with your name,/ full address and
phone number to go figure what
magazine,/108/,/93/ lombard avenue,
winnipeg, mb, r3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b3/b
SUM of 1..1,000,000 => 500000500000
What was the question again ?
The Perl script is not perfect, got rid of
an infinite loop with a stupid limit,
but it works okay.
Didn't got the last part fully working...
Anyway.
Hope this help.
|=R33 l33C|-| 2 @ uÑi\/ $c|-|0L@r$|-|iP
That's a real code damn it! =)
I'm not eligible, anyone cares?
Cryptnotic
My other first post is car post.
I checked, the natural number summation is by gauss.
...)
A variation of that can be used to sum the digits from 1 to n:
- sum from 1-9, get 45 (gauss).
- notice that the sums cycle with cycle length 10
- use the following forumula:
- m = (n+1)/10 (gets 1, 2, 3,
- [m * 45] + [(m(m-1)/2)*10]
- the second part of the sum is gauss
where n is 1 less than a multiple of 10. e.g. n can be 9, 19, 29, etc...
I think I got my math right. But I could be wrong.
The code can be found here
The solution can be found by starting up 'bc' and typing
ibase=4
And then each number of the puzzle.
The result is the number in the alphabet of the corresponding character.
Have fun
In the old times of FidoNet, I shared a BBS with several students. I was teaching computer science 101 then. At 00:00 AM, 8 hours before the exam, I posted the exam to the BBS, in postscript (with the first line deleted, so that it was not inmediately recognizable as such), and compressed with zoo (not a very popular compressor, now and them). I put a rubbish name on top, so that, well, it wasn't only using zoo and ghostview. I sent a message to the 3 students telling them that I had posted the message in the file area, without telling them the name or anything else. They managed to "crack" it the next morning, 2 hours before the exam. The zoo part was easy (it includes "zoo" as the first letter in the file), the PS file a bit harder, and the hardest part, 10 years ago, was to find a program to print PS (download it thru fidonet and all the stuff).
They passed, but not with high marks; after all, they had only a couple of hours to prepare it. They would have been better off studying thru the night...
It's just a BloJJ
I decoded the message. I guess I'm bored. I didn't quite get the numerals in the address though.
TO WIN A SCHOLARSHIP
FROM THE UNIVERSITY
OF LETHBRIDGE
DO THE MATH.
FORMULA:
FIND THE SUM OF ALL DECIMAL
DIGITS APPEARING IN THE NATURAL
NUMBERS FROM ONE TO ONE MILLION
INCLUSIVE.
CONTEST ENTRIES MUST BE
RECEIVED BY DECEMBER 12/31/01
TO ENTER ONLINE: VISIT
WWW.ULETH.CA AND SUBMIT YOUR
ANSWER.
MAIL: SEND YOUR ANSWER, ALONG
WITH YOUR NAME, FULL ADDRESS AND
PHONE NUMBER TO GO FIGURE WHAT
MAGAZINE,108/,93/ LOMBARD AVENUE,
WINNIPEG, MB, R3/B3/B1/.
Computed as follows:
0 + 1,000,000 = 1E6
1 + 999,999 = 1E6
2 + 999,998 = 1E6
...
499,998 + 500,002 = 1E6
499,999 + 500,001 = 1E6
and 500,000 left over.
so, we have 500,000 pairs equaling 1E6, giving 5E5 * 1E6 = 5E11. Add 5E5 left over, and you get your answer of 5.000005E11 = 500000500000.
Confirmed with the following bc program:
total=0;
for(i=0;i<=1000000;i++)
total+=i;
total
Using your sig line to advertise for friends is lame.
Writing the code to translate is cool, but my coding is rusty, so I did the decoding by:
Exporting the PDF as RTF
Reading the RTF into a word processor
Substituting the appropriate letter for each of the base-4 strings
But the math problem is trivial and can be done with pen and paper in about thirty seconds. Bearing in mind the decoded message has already been posted...
SPOILER WARNING...
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
...
Don't bother writing a program or anything, or even using a multi-precision calculator. Recognise that the summation can be done by adding opposing pairs, then a single multiplication.
1 + 1e6 = (1e6)+1.
0.5e6 + (0.5e6)+1 also = (1e6)+1.
Then just multiply it by 5e5. Paper and pen.
My only complaint is that the site must be slashdotted and I couldn't submit the solution. Sure, I live in Australia and can't really use a scholarship to U.Lethbridge (too late anyway, I know...)... but it just would've been fun. Sigh.
P.
True but you SHOULD copyright it, if just to be able to prove that you DID write it. Even poor man's copyright (seal in envelope, mail to yourself certified mail, never open envelope) works for this, but you need to do at least something so you're able to prove legally that you wrote it.
"Christ what a design! I could eat a handful of iron filings and PUKE a better emergency pump than that!"
perl -e 's/(\d)(\d)(\d)\//chr($1*16+$2*4+$3+64)/ge;print' CODE_GOES_HERE
jryan
http://www.perlmonks.org
A University in Canada had to expel 100 Computer Science juniors for breaking into the computer system and changing their grades.
You Like Science?
You Like bottomquark.
oops, am wrong. missed the recurrences (cycles are at 10^n for n > 0)
Your right, that scholarship should have gone to someone in athletics instead so he could get his CS degree. I think this is a good way of FOCUSING on students that normally wouldnt have as many chances at scholarships as your head of the football/hocky team types. Yes in some cases breaking encryption wouldnt be that hard, but how many people at your school would know how to, or even know how to spell encryption to begin with.
#!/usr/bin/perl, "020","021","100"," ","012",
,
,
, "011","."," ",
0 11","010"," ","002","121"," ","010","011","003","011","031","002","011","102", " ",
0 21","103","021","110",
0 ",".","003","001"," ","001","032","010"," ","103","111","002","031","021","110"," ",
" ,"121","033","111","102"," ",
0 30"," ",
, "102","011"," ",
, ",","1","0","8",",","9","3"," ","030","033","031","002",
1 ","032","021","100","011","013",",","031","002",", ",
" M","N","O","P","Q","R",
:)
@string = ("110","033"," ","113","021","032"," ","001"," ","103","003","020","033","030","001","102","103"
"102","033","031"," ","110","020","011"," ","111","032","021",
"112","011","102","103","021","110","121"," ","033","012"," ","030","011","110","020","002","102","021","010"
"013","011"," ","010","033"," ","110","020","011"," ","031","001","110","020"," ",
"012","033","102","031","111","030","001",":",
"012","021","032","010"," ","110","020","011"," ","103","111","031"," ","033","012"," ","001","030","030"," ","010","011","003",
"021","031","001","030"," ","010","021","013","021","110","103"," ","001","100","100","011","001","102","021","032"
"013"," ","021","032"," ","110","020","011"," ","032","001","110","111","102","001","030"," ",
"032","111","031","002","011","102","103"," ","012","102","033","031"," ","033","032","011"," ","110","033"," ","033","032",
"011","031","021","030","030","021","033","032"," ","021","032","003","030","111","103","021","112"
"003","033","032","110","011","103","110"," ","011","032","110","102","021","011","103"," ","031","111","103","110"," ",
"002","011","102","011","003","011","021","112","
"1","2","/","3","1","/","0","1"," ",
"110","033"," ","011","032","110","011","102"," ","033","032","030","021","032","011",":","112","
"113","113","113",".","111","030","011","110","02
"121","033","111","102"," ","001","032","103","113","011","102",".",
"031","001","021","030",":","103","01","032","010
"001","032","103","113","011","102",","," ","001","030","033","032","013"," ",
"113","021","110","020"," ","121","033","111","102"," ","032","001","031","011",",","012","111","030","
"001","010","010","102","011","103","103"," ","001","032","010"," ",
"100","020","033","032","011"," ","032","111","031","002","011","102"," ","110","033","013","033","012","021","013","111"
"113","020","001","110"," ","031","001","013","001","122","021","032","011"
"001","102","010"," ",
"001","112","011","032","111","011",",","113","02
"102","3","002","3","002","1","."
);
@chars = ("A","B","C","D","E","F","G","H","I","J","K","L",
"S","T","U","V","W","X","Y","Z");
for ($x = 0; $x = 455; ++$x) {
if (length($string[$x]) 2) { print $string[$x] }
else {
$baseten[$x] = chop($string[$x])*4**0 + chop($string[$x])*4**1 + chop($string[$x])*4**2;
print "$chars[$baseten[$x]-1]";
}
}
Output:
TO WIN A SCHOLARSHIP FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF LETHBRIDGE DO THE MATH FORMULA:FIND THE SUM OF ALL DECIMAL DIGITS APPEARING IN THE NATURAL NUMBERS FROM ONE TO ONEMILLION INCLUSIVE. CONTEST ENTRIES MUST BERECEIVED BY DECEMBER 12/31/01 TO ENTER ONLINE:VISIT WWW.ULETH.CA AND SUBMIT YOUR ANSWER.MAIL:SANDYOUR ANSWER, ALONG WITH YOUR NAME,FULL ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER TOGOFIGURE WHAT MAGAZINE,108,93 LOMBARD AVENUE,WINIPEG,MB,R3B3B1.
Too bad something like this wasn't around last
year when I was graduating highschool. Maybe
those colleges that rejected me would think
twice... Not that this is a serious cryptography problem, but still.. one has to wonder
http://fanblade.dhs.org:27902
I don't mean to burst your bubble, people, but this was aimed at pre-University 16-19 year olds. Unless you're in this age range I don't think it's a huge deal to have solved it...
Except, of course, uncopyrightable material, such as math problems as they were dealing with in this case.
as they pointed out on the website, it's a base 4 so if you know your binaries 00 01 10 11 well you just have to adapt to a base 4 00 01 02 03 10 11.. so 01=a 02=b i still have to sort the problem out though, but it seems to me like a pretty clever way to engage people if done jointly with a proper exam!
if the sites slashdot links to get slashdoted, how come slashdot itself never gets slashdoted??
Great, but as was already mentioned when others came up with this solution: It is the right answer to the wrong question. They asked to add the decimal values of all figures between 1 and 1E06.
Sig (appended to the end of comments I post, 54 chars)
The real, real answer for those amongst you seeking wisdom is as follows.
Sum of digits 1 through 9 = 45
Sum of digits 1 through 99 = 45 + (10 * 45) = 11 * 45
(we add up the digits in the one's place ten times, plus once again in the ten's place)
Sum of digits 1 through 999 = 45 + (10 * 45) + (100 * 45) = 111 * 45
And so by extension,
Sum of digits 1 through 999,999
= 111,111 * 45 = 4,999,995
Plus one more for the 1 in 1,000,000 gives you 4,999,996, which is a number worth a few thousand bucks to some sucker.
It *was* a test of their maths skills.
From the site "The challenge was to convert a mathematical problem into text from a confusing string of numbers. Then figure out the problem and email the answer to the university."
The world has changed and we all have become metal men.
D.. M.. C.. A..
Don't Mess with Company Assets
Decieving Many Consumer Assholes
Devious Money Consumes All
Diabolical Medling Corporate Attorneys
Etc.. etc..
EVERYBODY NOW.. It fun to violate the D.M.C.A..
D.M.C.A.
Starsucks
I don't know what kind of standards these American Colleges require, but that math problem was set in the same general form (1 to 1000) as some of the ones we did for fun in Primary School ("standard 4" or age 10)...
It is extraordinarily simple.
Spoiler Warning...
.
.
.
.
Imagine brute-forcing it by hand. (Oh the pain)
It would be easier if the number you were adding on was the same each time, yes? Ok, how do you make that happen?
Simple. Add in pairs.
Start with Nothing.
Add 1 and 999,999
Add 2 and 999,998
etc...
continue until you have just added 500,000 and 500,000. You'll need to subtract 500,000 because you added it twice... Ok, easy... Now add the 1,000,000 that you haven't added yet...
Well, it now seems that we add 1,000,000 500,000 times, subtract 500,000, then add 1,000,000...
That seems like multiplying 1,000,000 by 500,000 then adding 500,000 to me. Should a college student be ready to multiply and add yet?
Result: 500,000,500,000
Hardly scholarship material... In New Zealand primary school, we solved a specific case {1..1000} in 30 minutes, then a couple years later in intermediate (12 yrs old) we solved the general case using algebra. At 14 yrs old we were taught to solve similar problems again with algebraic summing of finite series (and that was the easier part of the course)
This is not a troll, but if this college seriously expects to vet scholorship recipients using this, perhaps they should use a REAL test.
Perhaps it's like the lottery rules in this country - if the lottery runners are not a registered non-profit organisation, they get taxed, so they make you answer a completely brainless question as part of a "competition", then randomly pick out the winner because they had "too many correct answers"...
Singing bye-bye,
this part of the hard drive,
maybee data, someday later,
now it's just gotten fried.
I pressed a button, kissed his data goodbye,
I hope this makes my customer cry,
I hope this makes my customer cry.
HelpGeeks - don't bother visiting, it's not worth it! Really!
Not seen anyone post a C program for the second
part, so here's the trivial code:
#include <stdio.h>
int main()
{
int loop,total=0,remain;
for (loop=1;loop<=1000000;loop++)
{
remain=loop;
while (remain) { total+=remain%10; remain/=10; }
}
printf("%d\n",total);
return(0);
}
Prints out 27000001 in 0.17 seconds on my P4 box.
Not exactly a tricky one !
This is a harder problem than you might think, but it's not helped by the idiots who can't even understand the question and try to add the numbers 1 to 1,000,000.
For my CS Master we were to be able to crack a code so to have some points. AFAIK that still is a bonus for the students here and they don't go to jail everytime they succeedd on breaking the code. :-)
------I can please only one person per day. Today is not your day. Tomorrow isn't looking good either.------
tastes great (with lemon, none of this ice crap or fizzy sugar water). And its cheap (well, 30 roubles at a nightclub seems reasonable to me, maybe not if I was on Russian wages).
Cuecat was pretty trivial, too, remember?
The complexity of the object does not seem to mitigate the draconian principle being applied to it.
Would I be right in thinking that, even if you applied for this canadian job in canada, but if your email describing the decryption method travelled through american property (i.e. servers) then you could be arrested in the US for breaking something which could conceivably be used to protect copyright?
Remember, DeCSS can be expressed as a prime number, as can any document, so mathematical problems have no special advantage.
The point is about solving a problem. It is about the thought processes involved, not necessarily the difficulty involved in the encoding technique. What the fsck do you expect them to do? Publish a 1024 bit PGP encrypted problem and have potential candidates use distributed.net to crack the code?
Sheesh! Give them some credit. It's better than the usual approach to University entrance (a letter from daddy, with a fat cheque, to the dean).
Now bugger off and get out to the curb, the school bus is coming any minute now.
:wq
After all, the encryption they broke wouldn't have been a major company's. Remember, the DCMA only applies if you break the encryption of a company (or if a company feels that your breaking the encryption in any way impacts their bottom line). Then that company releases the lawyers on you. While the students would have technically violated the DCMA, they wouldn't go to jail over it. (Ok, I know that the DCMA really applies in all cases, but for all practical purposes it will only come into play if a company with lawyers feels threatened by the code cracking.)
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
...our cryptography professor encrypted all our homework assignments. We'd have to decipher the text and then answer the questions.
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
Cool, this is the university I graduated from and I can bet that
I know who's responsible for this. Jonathan Seldin,
the euopean god of lamba calculus, who was also my
cryptology professor; and a damn good prof too, if I might add.
So what university did you attend?
Please cease and desist the use of chanting letters. Our clients (the RIAA & The Village People) are very upset.
Thank you,
Icky Lawyer
Oliver's army is here to stay Oliver's army are on their way And I would rather be anywhere else But here today
The hardest of the whole thing was running find and replace for their base 4 alphabet(I was too lazy to write a script for it)...
:-)
You know, Thomas Edison (aka. the a**hole who ripped off Tesla) supposedly said that "Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration". I'd say the same saying applies to undergraduate-level university work. If someone is "too lazy to write a script for it", they might find university level CS surprisingly hard even if they're the next Alan Turing.
(Yes, I know you're just trying to make a point. But so am I
Freedom: "I won't!"
First, Professor Felten WAS NOT PROSECUTED FOR BREAKING THE ENCRYPTION. He faced prosecution for publishing and presenting his work. That is a HUGE distinction. Obviously, it's something I still disagree with; but it's important to get the facts right.
Second, it may be feasible that a college student could be charged with something under the DMCA if the university got some bug up its arse over him/her; but it would require an idiot of a prosecutor. The university invited the act, and it would end up much as if they had hired the kid to break into their own office as a test of security. Weird things happen, so I'd never say never; but let's try to show a bit more reason.
Hot Damn! It's the Soggy Bottom Boys!
In the one million and one decimal numbers mentioned there are only 10 digits to be found;
0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 and 9
I sincerely hope the University of Lethbridge(?) regarded the sum of the above as a valid answer. Whilst I think 27,000,001 is also a valid answer, from the wording of the question it isn't the only answer.
English is a much more ambiguous language then mathematics...
The DMCA is a bad law, but it does NOT prevent anyone from doing cryptography or breaking it. It ONLY applies to circumvention of access control to a COPYRIGHTED WORK. It is copyright law, not encryption law.
I think slashdot is perpetuating misunderstanding about this law, and I think that hurts our cause. Being informed is the first and most important step. Otherwise, we are just clueless zealots.
A 16 year old person is probably about as intellectually mature as they're going to get. Their brains are pretty hardwired by that time as to what manner in which they learn and stuff like that. If it's meant to be challenging to a 16 year old, then it's meant to be challenging to an adult (16-year olds *are* adults, but that's another topic altogether).
The reason it isn't a huge deal to have solved it is because it wasn't meant to be *that* challenging -- they expected lots of people to solve it (and 100 did).
If it were targeted toward 6-9 year olds, then your statement would have more validity. As it is, you sound like you've got sour grapes because you coldn't figure it out, and so you're trying to denigrate not only the people who posted the answer, but the original class of people it was aimed towards.
In post-9/11 America, the CIA interrogates YOU!
<?php
.= "012/102/033/031/ 110/020/011/ 111/032/021/112/011/102/103/021/110/121/\n";
.= "033/012/ 030/011/110/020/002/102/021/010/013/011/\n";
.= "\n";
.= "010/033/ 110/020/011/ 031/001/110/020/.\n";
.= "\n";
function to_letter($code) {
if (is_numeric($code)) {
return chr(64 + base_convert($code, 4, 10));
} else {
return $code;
}
}
$data = "110/033/ 113/021/032/ 001/ 103/003/020/033/030/001/102/103/020/021/100/\n";
$data
$data
$data
$data
$data
// etc.
$data = split("/", $data);
foreach ($data AS $char) {
echo nl2br(ereg_replace("[0-9/]", "", $char));
echo to_letter($char);
}
?>
but you need to do at least something so you're able to prove legally that you wrote it.
You mean like emailing it out to 100 people?
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
If you read your spam, you can get degrees without even going to classes.
-Dr. Bruce
If that's the entirety of the message that was decoded, then you'd be correct. Since the previous poster claimed that "they didn't bother" to copyright it, rather than "they couldn't" copyright it, I assumed that there was more to it than just the math problem.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
But isn't this what standardized tests like the SAT and ACT are for? And don't these standardized tests do a better job?
Maybe I'm missing the point.
Easily the best prof. I have ever had came up with this. From the National Post:
"The problem was created by Wolfgang Holzmann, a Lethbridge computer science professor, using a computer code called Base4 to substitute numbers for letters of the alphabet."
Let's hear it former ulethians, give it up for Wolf!!
as I'm sure all of your parents will eventually tell you, "if you don't like the rules then move the hell out."
If you look at all combinations from 000,000 to 999,999 (might as well include zero), each digit in each position appears 100,000 times. So, since the sum of 0 to 9 is 45, the summation for each digit position is 4.5e6. So, the total for six digits is 27e6. Add 1 for the 1,000,000 final input number, and you get 27,000,001. Now where's my degree?
"(As a Troll-y sidenote, I'd like to mention with some degree of bitterness that I submitted this story, except when I did it, I got the facts right. Apparently this warrants a rejection, and irrelevant whining about the DMCA warrants approval. Do you ever wonder why /. gets a bad reputation from time to time?)"
Preach on brother.
[o]_O
"Linux is only free if your time is worthless"
I'm curious, is that your quote or someone else's? Thanks in advance
[o]_O
I had Wolf for Linear Algebra. Great guy.
The problem took me 10 minute 30 to solve...
-Dave
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
925300204
--larsw
I did something similiar a while back (ACK! 6 years alread!) in CMPT 401 (Operating Systems II) at SFU (Simon Fraser University) one of the assignments was to :)
:)
m l
a) decrypt a RSA encoded message
b) Answer the questions, since the message was an assignment
The twist was that there the message didn't use ASCII, but a smaller subset. A table was provided of character set. E and D were small, so that you could brute-force it if you wanted to.
It's not funny, when you decode the message over a weekend, and realize the instructor didn't properly encode the message
Definately was a cool assignment, though
Example of RSA
http://world.std.com/~franl/crypto/rsa-example.ht
No. Or, rather, it'd get thrown out and the prosecutor ridiculed. Go read the law.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
You're not doing your country any good if you mismanage to the point where you're unprofitable, then collapse so that neither your jobs nor your products (or services) exist anymore.
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
You guys and girls are all a bunch of Freakz ... (thats me being jelous for not finding it first :O)
:)
For one this way the publisity they want they'll get
Here's a simple extension of their idea, to determine which students to let into college: Rather than including only one math problem, give students a bunch of math problems. Make some of the problems easy, some of them hard. Include another section with questions about their knowledge of language, too. You'd have to standardize it somehow, so that students all over were taking the same test. Then, the students who get the best scores could be admitted to better colleges, and have a better chance at scholarships! This is a great idea!
Williams said that a large poster and contest information was created using a computer code -- called Base4 -- which substitutes a series of numbers for letters of the alphabet. .. Since when is Base4 considered computer code?
Just went there folks and, its is down.
I just found a terminal to let you know first about the breaking news. I am sure there will be an article on the main page soon.
I'll keep you posted....
Since when is converting the alphabet to its base4 numeric value considered encryption?
Hey, MPAA if you're reading this, this would be a perfect replacement for CSS!
Anything you write is automatically copyrighted. You don't have to register it or anything anymore.
You have to register it if you want to collect damages when you are violated. Otherwise, if you just want to control use of your work, you're correct.
Seriously... And sadly...
Contrary to popular belief, coding is not all free blow-jobs and beer. Those things cost MONEY!
I figured the encryption algorithm out in about 30 seconds by inspection. There is probably a very clever solution to the problem the message poses, but I'd just work it out by brute force.
It's sometimes amazing what are considered "difficult" math problems. An example I read in the newspaper that was supposedly in a national mathematics contest:
I figured this one out in my head while eating at McDonalds.
...laura
This kind of posting is absurd and should be absent from this site. How do you expect to have a decent discussion when you refer to your reader as "moron". This underestimates the reader's opinion of what the society thinks of him, and as a result, the reader could in response think of how to return the insult instead of answering your comment and thus contribute beneficially to the discussion. This is why probably you were moderated down. Please try to be more polite, and then you will see that people may actually start to reply and you will have a beautifull thread.
please visit my site on-line
http://NOSPAM.goatse.NOSPAM.cx
Crack the code, go to Lethbridge? Are you sure this isn't some secret police sting?
Why would smart people want to go somewhere where the wind are so strong it regularly blows over the cows? Where a trip to the Hutterite community is considered a "grand weekend out?"
OBDisclaimer: I guess Lethbridge isn't that bad really. After all, it's not Regina.
I think they were watching that part from a beautiful mind, where John Nash saw the numbers lighting up that were the correct sequence of numbers. Is that what they're hoping for? Come on, CS has alot more to do with other things than crytography. We have crytography here as a two credit hour seminar in CS. Figuring out an encrytion key != brilliant computer science student. More likely means that they are good at figuring out patterns. What about the 7 bridge 2 river problem from discrete math. That would be a more logical problem to try.
the decrypted problem specifies the sum of the digits in the numbers 1-1000000, not the numbers themselves, the answer is therefore 4999996
(45*111111+1)
... especially management consulting where they use the dreaded case interview. Some of them include trick math problems like this one. The goal is not really to get the answer but to see how you think. The "correct" answer to this encoded math question is not an additive loop program but to recognize the 0+n + 1+(n-1) + ... function.
- Consult the dictionary frequently to avoid mispelling
int Summation(int limit)
{
int i,j,l,k;
k=0;
for(i=0;i<=limit;i++) {
j=i;
l=j%10;
while(j>0)
{
j=j/10;
l+=(j%10);
}
k+=l;
}
Umm...not sure this would be acceptable - I'm not clear on the status of email in the courtroom. I think it would end up being personal testimony from the people you sent it to rather than material evidence in the form of email. I still hold that the most reliable poor man's copyright is just print it, mail it certified, and don't open it. Then you have the post office cancellation stamp and the thingy certifying when and to who it was delivered, which is usable as legal evidence in court.
"Christ what a design! I could eat a handful of iron filings and PUKE a better emergency pump than that!"
Perhaps figuring out the navigation to their site is another part of the challenge. ;-)
To get something done, a committee should consist of no more than three persons, two of them absent.
As a 14 year old with little programming knowledge in a below average math class, that code was pretty simple. The underlined url was the major tip off, www.uleth.ca. And the rest just falled into place after that. For those who are interested, her is part of what i've decoded so far....
TO WIN A SCHOLASHIP FROM THE UNIVERSITY OF LETHBBRIDGE.
DO THE MATH
FORMULAE:
FIND THE SUM OF ALL DECIMAL DIGITS APPEARING IN THE NATURAL NUMBERS FROM ONE TO ONE MILLION INCLUSIVE...
Theres still quite a bit left in the message, but I'm rather lazy. And as for the math problem, my TI-83 is calculating computing the total now (it's only 6mhz, it could take a while). But it's kinda sad how simple the encryption was. Not as bad as Adobe's ROT-13, but close.
for those who enjoy simple cryptanalysis:
perl -0777pe'$a="a";s/[a-z]/$b{lc$&}||=$a++/gei' filename
I use paragraphs of Jane Austin from Project Guttenburg to feed the cypher generator.
Quattuor res in hoc mundo sanctae sunt: libri, liberi, libertas et liberalitas.
Don't they know security through obscurity doesn't work!?
Dacels Jewelers can't be trusted.
#include #include #include int Base4(int limit) { int j,l,m; j=limit; l=j%10; m=0; while(j>0) { l += (4 * (m * j)); j=j/10; m++; } return l; } char Letter(int num) { return (char) num+64; } #define messagesize 1000 // Whatever the message size is
void Decode()
{
int NumberList[messagesize] = { /* Put the message here */ };
for(int i=0;imessagesize;i++) {
printf("%c",Letter(Base4(NumberList[i])));
}
}
void main()
{
Decode();
}
They could have helped by having a text version instead of just a graphic we have to type in ourselves *_*
That was damn easy. The hardest part was transcribing the numbers.
--- Robert Strickland
Sum(1,n) = (n*(n+1))/2
Thus Sum(1,1000000) = blah (too lazy to get my calculator).
Hehh, Newton deduced this some 300 years ago.
I am not qualified, but who care?
it says "THE SUM OF ALL DECIMAL
DIGITS"
I think they just want the sum of the digits.
IE: 1+2+3+4+5+6+7+8+9+1+0+1+1+1+2+1+3+1+4 etc.
as in for 15 you would add 1 and 5 to your total...
but then again maby I'm wrong...
not quite you have to find the total of all the digits in numbers 1-1000000 not the sum of all the digits of all the posible combinations between them.
IE: the lower numbners repeat many times.
IE: the lower numbners repeat many times.
So what? Each digit position ultimately shows each digit 0-9 the same number of times and addition is totally commutative.
int main( int argc, char *argv[] )
{
long i, sum;
for (i=1,sum=0; i
crap...
int main( int argc, char *argv[] )
{
long i, sum;
for (i=1,sum=0; i <= 1000000; i++) {
sum += (i/1000000)%10 + (i/100000)%10 + (i/10000)%10
+ (i/1000)%10 + (i/100)%10 + (i/10)%10 + i%10;
}
printf("sum = %ld\n", sum);
return( 0 );
}
$ a.out
sum = 27000001
What is wrong with Slashdot <TT> indentation?
the code is not hard. But i believe that this is a trick question. It asks for the sum of the decimal digits of real numbers. Real numbers do not have decimal digits.
.010101 -decimal digits
3 -real number no decimals
so answer is: 0
Nice. I wish my school would have done that.
= sn ippet&id=101008
Well, I wrote a python script that will handle decrypting the code. It aslo takes decrypted text, and encrypts it (on the fly). There's also file encryption/decryption built in.
Check it out
https://sourceforge.net/snippet/detail.php?type
python >>>
reduce(lambda x,y:x+y,map(lambda x:chr(ord(x)^42),tuple('zS^BED\nX_FOY\x0b')))
Yes, you were originally right.
(I was thinking of it more like an odometer) In that each number is only counted when it changes.
BTW: You didn't earn yourself a degree, but just admission to the college.